Oct. 1, 2012
Rachel Kraft
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1100
rachel.h.kraft@nasa.gov
Kim Henry
Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala.
256-544-0034
kimberly.m.henry@nasa.gov
RELEASE: 12-339
NASA AWARDS SPACE LAUNCH SYSTEM ADVANCED BOOSTER CONTRACTS
WASHINGTON -- NASA has awarded three contracts totaling $137.3 million
to improve the affordability, reliability and performance of an
advanced booster for the Space Launch System (SLS). The awardees will
develop engineering demonstrations and risk reduction concepts for a
future version of the SLS, a heavy-lift rocket that will provide an
entirely new capability for human exploration beyond low Earth orbit.
The initial 77-ton (70-metric-ton) SLS configuration will use two
5-segment solid rocket boosters similar to the boosters that helped
power the space shuttle to orbit. The evolved 143-ton
(130-metric-ton) SLS vehicle will require an advanced booster with
more thrust than any existing U.S. liquid- or solid-fueled boosters.
These new initiatives will demonstrate and examine advanced booster
concepts and hardware demonstrations during a 30-month period.
The companies selected for SLS Advanced Booster contracts are:
-- ATK Launch Systems Inc. of Brigham City, Utah, which will
demonstrate innovations for a solid-fueled booster. The contract
addresses the key risks associated with low-cost solid propellant
boosters, particularly in the areas of composite case design and
development, propellant development and characterization, nozzle
design and affordability enhancement, and avionics and controls
development.
-- Dynetics Inc. of Huntsville, Ala., which will demonstrate the use
of modern manufacturing techniques to produce and test several
primary components of the F-1 rocket engine originally developed for
the Apollo Program, including an integrated powerpack, the primary
rotating machinery of the engine. Additionally, the contract will
demonstrate innovative fabrication techniques for metallic cryogenic
tanks.
-- Northrop Grumman Corporation Aerospace Systems of Redondo Beach,
Calif., which will demonstrate innovative design and manufacturing
techniques for composite propellant tanks with low fixed costs and
affordable production rates. Independent time and motion studies will
compare demonstration affordability data to SLS advanced booster
development, production and operations.
Additional contracts may be awarded following successful negotiation
of other proposals previously received for this NASA Research
Announcement (NRA), subject to funding availability.
Designed to be flexible for launching payloads and spacecraft,
including NASA's Orion spacecraft that will take humans beyond low
Earth orbit, SLS will enable the agency to meet the Obama
Administration's goal of sending humans to an asteroid by 2025 and to
Mars in the 2030s.
The first flight test of NASA's SLS, an uncrewed mission to lunar
orbit, which will feature a configuration for a 77-ton lift capacity,
is scheduled for 2017. As SLS evolves, a two-stage launch vehicle
configuration will provide a lift capability of 143 tons and include
the improved, more powerful advanced booster.
These new contracts are funded under an NRA risk mitigation effort and
acquisition. There will be a future competition for design,
development, testing and evaluation for the SLS advanced booster.
This future competition is planned for 2015 and will be acquired
through a separate solicitation. The 2015 competition will not be
limited to awardees announced in this NRA. Successful offerors to
this NRA are not guaranteed an award for any future advanced booster
acquisition.
As NASA endeavors to send humans to a range of new destinations,
agency initiatives are helping develop a U.S. commercial space
transportation industry with the goal of achieving safe, reliable and
cost-effective transportation to and from the International Space
Station and low Earth orbit. Ongoing advances made by NASA's
commercial space partners are paving the way for regular contract
flights of cargo to the space station and marking progress toward a
launch of astronauts from U.S. soil in the next five years.
NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. manages the
SLS Program for the agency. SLS will launch from NASA's Kennedy Space
Center in Florida. For information about NASA's Space Launch System,
visit:
http://www.nasa.gov/sls
-end-